Ken Schultz Loves to Make 'Em Laugh, Even in Church

As a high schooler, Ken Schultz decided he wanted to be an entertainer.

So he did what any kid would do: He taught himself how to eat fire.

“A guy I knew described over the phone how,” Schultz said nonchalantly as he began the fire-eating tale. It ended with him in the back yard, his mother nearby with the water hose, and “a few blistered lips and fingers later.”

No big deal. Just a matter of learning breath control, wind direction and the right angles.

“My method would not be what I’d recommend to kids,” he said, laughing.

Now seriously, folks.

Schultz may have taken the difficult path to being an entertainer. But today, as both a professional performer—and a community pastor at in Plainfield—he has found the way to spreading happiness.

For 26 years, Schultz has been eating fire, juggling knives, riding a unicycle and making balloon animals for a living. He performs at Navy Pier five days a month and throughout Winter WonderFest, which opens Dec. 2. He’s also a regular at Pheasant Run Resort in St. Charles, and recently performed at the Bolingbrook Promenade and aboard the Polar Express in Downers Grove.

Most Sundays, Schultz incorporates his physical skills, slapstick and audience participation into a five-minute kids’ message as part of the worship service at Crosswinds. He’s done a faceplant into a pie to illustrate Jesus accepting punishment for our sins and blasted toilet paper off a roll with a leaf blower to analogize rushing wind on the day of Pentecost.

“I use a variety of silly or fun things to help them to connect to gospel stories,” he said. “Juggling, magic and different things help Bible stories come alive.”

While the church is a relatively new part of his life—he and fellow Plainfield resident John Stillman founded Crosswinds in 2005—Schultz was inspired to perform back in high school, where he was a pole vaulter and football player in Hinsdale. He remembers visiting a retirement home supported by the hospital where his mom worked and being struck by how "the entertainment (for the seniors) was always lousy,” Schultz said.

He was determined to make a change for the senior residents, and found the answer one summer watching jugglers at a festival in Eugene, Ore., where his dad lived. He and a few friends taught themselves how to juggle through practice, practice, practice. Their first performance juggling apples, knives, clubs and rings at the senior center was a hit, and they landed jobs around Chicago while still in high school.

Afterward, Schultz was hired by the King Richard's Faire (now the Bristol Renaissance Faire) and toured amusement parks.

“My parents thought I was crazy,” he said. “They had a plan for me to go to college and be a normal person.”

Then, around age 19 or 20, he headed to California with $400 in a backpack.

“At that time there were a lot of good street performers in California, like Venice Beach in L.A. and Pier 39 in San Francisco,” said Schultz, who stayed at YMCAs or youth hostels and lived off daily tips of $100 or so. “Of course it was scary, but God showed me where to go and what to do. I had most of the physical skills by the end of high school and in California I learned how to work an audience.”

Schultz also taught himself how to ride a unicycle, “One of the hardest things I’ve ever learned,” after hundreds of falls. And he learned how to walk on stilts … after telling an agent he already could.

“For the most part I learned my craft through hard knocks,” he said.

That hard-knock life paid off.

In addition to performing at Navy Pier the past 15 years, Schultz also is a hit with colleges, schools, libraries and park districts. His corporate client list includes Pfizer, Amoco, Allstate, General Mills, Arlington Park Race track, Xerox, Whirlpool, USA Today and various country and athletic clubs.

Schultz, 47, a Plainfield resident for 22 years, has been the opening act for such famous folks as comedian Judy Tenuta and singer Neil Sedaka, and he's appeared on television’s “The Untouchables” and “The Bozo Show.”

The Taste of Chicago, Taste of Joliet, Canal Days in Lockport and Naperville Last Fling have been stops on his festival circuits over the years.

He says he is one of the quickest balloon artists around, once making 5,000 balloon creatures in four days at Navy Pier.

“To keep up with crowd you have to be speedy,” he said. “But I like to make sure all the kids gets one so I focus on quantity not quality.”

Nonetheless, his smooching balloon pups inside a heart are adorable.

But don’t expect him to apply clown makeup and be the entertainment at your kid’s birthday party. Private parties aren’t really his thing.

“I weigh about 350 pounds and most people don’t want a big buy riding through their house on a unicycle,” said Schultz, who likes to make it look like he is losing his balance on the one wheel, especially with a kid on his shoulders.

“Comedy is all about tension and release. I’ve never dropped anybody … except my wife,” he said, explaining a head cold threw him off balance at a trade show.

Kathy, his wife, is no longer his assistant, but does appreciate her husband’s popular performances that help support their family, which includes son Cody, 19, a business major at Iowa State University, and daughter Meghan, 21, a cruise ship hostess and tour guide in New Zealand.

Schultz also has a sideline business called Variety Plus Media Host and offers web design, digital video production and consulting fellow entertainers, churches and other clients.

Crosswinds Church, which is located in the former police station on Route 59, is a small but growing ministry that doesn’t provide a full-time salary.

Schultz serves as the community pastor and Stillman, a nuclear engineer, serves as the teaching pastor.

As the community pastor, Schultz said his role is “to reach out to Plainfield to show love and kindness to show who God is.”

He has hosted free ice cream socials and organized car washes and trick-or-treating for canned goods.

Whether serving at the church or Navy Pier, Schultz’s routines are full of slapstick and audience participation.

“I’m silly. I’m fun. I consider myself a family entertainer,” Schultz said. “But my real focus is building this church in Plainfield. God can use a juggler to build the church. After all, Peter the Apostle was just a fisherman. I feel blessed to be here in Plainfield.”

For information about Crosswinds Church, visit www.xwindschurch.org.

For more information on Ken Schultz’s performances, visit www.flyingfool.com or www.facebook.com/flyingfool.